Leadership and leadership research should be viewed in a particular context. The contextual lens is largely neglected when Afrocentric leadership in organisations is framed. The purpose of this study was to assess whether the qualitative assertions that there are distinctive characteristics that underpin Afrocentric leadership in organisations can be authenticated by an empirical study conducted in Southern Africa. The aim is to determine and validate a leadership behaviour taxonomy within the regional context using an empirical paradigm in a cross-sectional design. The sample was drawn from 30 organisations in Southern Africa: South Africa, Swaziland, Namibia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique, consisting of 1,676 participants from all sectors. The original conceptualisation of leadership in terms of a Westernised leadership behaviour taxonomy was statistically confirmed, in a unique permutation. This literature as well as the empirical findings revealed that while some leadership behaviours are generic, there are unique behaviours in an Afrocentric leadership taxonomy. This context specific taxonomy includes the following meta-categories: task, relations, a combined category change and external, and an additional unique African meta-category, which has a participatory, democratic and communalistic focus. As this is a first empirical study of this nature and magnitude, it could serve as a reference for further conceptualisation of Afrocentric leadership. The reconfigured meta-category taxonomy has been positively examined for structural validity as well as an assessment of convergent and discriminant validity. Recommendations are made about further research in testing the universal application of this leadership taxonomy in Africa. Recommendations were made for future research and the application of the findings to leadership in Africa.

中文翻译：

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南部非洲的领导层：区域性以非洲为中心的等级分类法

领导力和领导力研究应在特定背景下进行。当组织以非洲为中心的领导者时，上下文的镜头在很大程度上被忽略了。这项研究的目的是评估是否可以通过在南部非洲进行的一项实证研究来证实关于组织中以非洲为中心的领导基础的独特特征的定性断言。目的是在横截面设计中使用经验范式来确定和验证区域内的领导行为分类法。样本来自南部非洲的30个组织：南非，斯威士兰，纳米比亚，津巴布韦和莫桑比克，共有来自各部门的1,676名参与者。从西方化的领导行为分类学出发，对领导的最初概念化在统计学上得到了证实，并具有独特的排列方式。该文献以及经验发现表明，尽管某些领导行为是通用的，但在以非洲为中心的领导分类法中却存在独特的行为。此特定于上下文的分类法包括以下元类别：任务，关系，合并的类别更改和外部类别，以及另外一个独特的非洲元类别，其重点是参与性，民主和社群主义。由于这是关于这种性质和规模的第一个实证研究，因此可以作为进一步将非洲中心领导概念化的参考。已对重新配置的元类别分类法进行了结构有效性以及聚合有效性和判别有效性的评估。提出了有关在非洲测试这种领导分类法的普遍应用的进一步研究的建议。为今后的研究提出了建议，并将研究结果应用于非洲的领导层。